Life insurance needs calculator (incl. term-vs-whole section)

Published 2026-09-30 · Last updated 2026-09-30.

DIME inputs — what you enter, and why

DIME stands for Debt, Income, Mortgage and Education. That is the map's stated method, and it is the method the working HTML tool on this page uses.

Keep the mortgage separate from other debts

Mortgage debt has its own field because it is usually the largest single obligation and the one that decides whether a family can stay in the home. Listing it separately also stops double-counting: debts in the first field must be non-mortgage debts only.

• Debt: non-mortgage debts your family would still owe — credit cards, auto loans, student loans and personal loans. Keep the mortgage separate, because it has its own field below.
• Income: the annual income your family would need replaced, multiplied by the number of years you want that replacement to last. Think about how long dependants would need support, not about a round number that sounds familiar.
• Mortgage: the remaining balance, so your family could stay in the home without that monthly payment.
• Education: the total you want set aside for each child's education, added per child.
• Minus what you already have: existing life cover plus liquid savings that could genuinely be used for these needs. Employer cover counts only with a warning: it usually ends when the job ends, so treat it as temporary cover, not permanent protection.

Enter each figure from your own documents. Do not copy a default. The HTML tool's prefilled figures are labelled ILLUSTRATIVE DEFAULTS in the tool itself, and you should replace every one of them.

Your coverage need — how the total works

The tool calculates: coverage need = debts + (income × years) + mortgage + education − existing cover and savings. It shows the total before rounding, so you can see exactly which input drives the answer. If existing cover already exceeds the calculated need, the tool should tell you that plainly, rather than showing a negative need as if it were a purchase target — a surplus means the DIME inputs, as entered, are already covered on paper, and the next question is whether those inputs are complete, not whether to buy more.

A DIME total is a quantity of cover, not a product recommendation. The same sum can be bought as term cover, as whole cover, or as a combination, at very different prices. That is why the term-vs-whole section sits on this page rather than on a separate page: you size the need once, then compare how different policy types would carry that same need.

Check the result against a second lens. A simple income multiple — for example, ten times annual income — is a rough sanity check, not a replacement for DIME. If the two answers differ sharply, look for the reason: a large mortgage, several children, heavy debts, or a long income-replacement period will all push DIME above a simple multiple, and that difference is information, not an error.

ILLUSTRATIVE EXAMPLE — not a policy fact

A household enters, purely to show the arithmetic: debts $25,000; income to replace $75,000 a year for 10 years ($750,000); mortgage $240,000; education $0 in this illustration; existing cover and savings $120,000. The calculation is $25,000 + $750,000 + $240,000 + $0 − $120,000 = $895,000. Change any input and the total moves with it — that sensitivity is the point of the tool. These figures are ILLUSTRATIVE ONLY, entered to demonstrate the formula; they describe no real household and no insurer's price.

Term-vs-whole comparison MODE — a section, not a separate page

In this mode you enter a term premium and a whole premium for the same cover amount, plus the years to compare. The fixed HTML tool now computes, from your own inputs:

• total term cost and total whole cost over the comparison years, and the difference between them;
• an estimated cash value for the whole policy, built from user-entered, changeable illustrative assumptions: the share of each whole premium assumed to go to cash value, and an assumed annual growth rate on that cash value;
• a breakeven year: the first year, within your comparison horizon, in which that estimated cash value reaches or passes the cumulative extra cost of whole over term — or a clear statement that no breakeven occurs within the horizon under those assumptions.

Read the cash-value and breakeven outputs as illustrations of a model, not as a policy illustration. Real cash value grows on a schedule set by the carrier and the contract, and it is reduced by loans and withdrawals. No insurer rate is stored in this tool, and no cash-value figure here is a quote or a projection for any real policy. If you change the growth assumption, the breakeven year moves — try that yourself before you draw any conclusion from it.

Next steps — what to do with the number

1. Re-check the inputs that moved the total most, usually income years and mortgage balance.
2. Read the term-vs-whole explained article to decide which policy type could carry this need, and for how long.
3. Compare the need with what you already hold, including employer cover, and note any gap that only lasts a few years — a short need and a lifelong need are different problems.
4. Check your own policy wording and the authoritative source type below before deciding anything. This page does not sell cover and does not recommend a policy.